Life — March 29, 1900 — page 14: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

-LIFE- HE efforts of Yale University to make its divinity school turn out better ministers are worth attention, The school scems to be an excellent machine, but its products have not becn of a quality sufficiently superior to command the best markets, Accordingly close attention is being paid to both the selection of the best obtainable grades of raw material and to improvement in the processes of manufacture, It was thought that owing to the accumulated benefactions Yale and Theology. of pivus decedents it had become rather too cheap and easy to be a Yule theologue. That has been corrected in some measure, und the plan is that each man who protits by benevolences shall work for what he receives, Students also are to apply themselves less exclusively to theology and more to other branches of learning, and are to try in various ways to be more human, more self-reliant, more generally intelligent, and somewhat less ke the ordinary run of contemporary theologues. These are all worthy efforts on Yale’s part, and we ought all to hope that they will be blessed. The ministry, somehow, seems to be a difficult business in these times. can fairly enrn a good living are comparatively scarce init, while An Important Question ! HICH is the meanest city in the United States ? This is an important question, and one that Lirk would like to have definitely settled, With that object in view, we offer A Prize of Fifty Dollars in Gold for the best statement of facts which prove that any particular city is the meanest ono in this country. Conditions. Competitors must mit thelr arguments to three hundred words each. Write on one side of the paper only. ‘The contest will close May 1st, 1900, and the award will be made as soon thereafter ax the respective merits of the arguments can be determined. ‘The winning argument will be printed, together with such others as may seem to Live worthy of that distingulshed honor, Names and addresses of the writers should accompany all manuscripts, In no case will these be printed withont the permission of the wer oxe who desire thelr manuscripts returned should enclose # stamped aud addressed return envelope. Fach manuscript may bear a pseudonym, which will be printed with the argument. The FAitors of Lire ure to he the sole Judges of the merits of the argument. Superior men who cir ‘There are mean citles and mean cities, but the next city in the United States (that ts, if any city in New Jersey can be regarded as in the United States) 1s unquestionably Jersey City. Jersey City can be briefly described asa con- glomeration of liquor saloons, railroad tracks and dirty streets. Jersey Clty possesses only one ad- vantage, and that ts the facility and rapidity with Which one can escape from ft. ‘There Is not a residence without its trolley or railroad car at its door, Every citizen keeps next to his heart # schedule of the quickest time that can he made from his house to New York, It ts the one re- deeming feature that the towa boasts of. Yon can get out of it iu a remarkably short space of time, One who has Been There. RAPOLIS. Meaneapolls tn the State of Meanesota, WS. ‘The narrowest, meanest, least cosmopolitan and by nature the worst endowed 1s Chicago, ‘The definition of Chicago (Indtan name), Mephitis Mephitica, ts fltting. What greets the traveler on arrival there, comes from ptain mud and garbage on the streets, or the canal working. This statement Is made as a mutter of Justice to the poor Mephitis Mephit- Ica. Chicago's climate ts the meanest in the world ; this ts adinitted without argumen: hat she elects: to remain filthy the traveler will observe, What really makes Chicago the meanest city in the world are her people, You cannot make a purse out of a sow’s ear. Chicago 1s vulgar, Men and women are called tadiex and gents Jim Bunnie: COMB ON, FELLOWS! COME IN AND GET Wars. ministers who lack duc employment, and duc capacity for usefulness, abound. mapy men who do not lack faith are yet distrustful of creeds, and in matters of belief which may not readily be proved, would rather feel their way along than gulp down at the outset what may presently give them fits of spiritual indigestion. Part of the trouble is, no doubt, that in Chicago. The gent" Is chesty, full of hot alr, Wears a high hat with tweed sults, tsengaged in numberless business enterprises im which no money changes hands It ts Impossible to refine or broaden the male ; he 1s too vain and seif-oplntonated, ‘The bustness principle of Chicago 1s Catchem and Skinem, From the minute you arrive and daring your enforced detention there, you are cinched, ut you form a rapid though correct Idea of her general all-round meanness. As to her Government, ber Altgetda and Tanners xpeak for that; we resent the national disgrace they have brought upon us, Now the new drainage canal ts comp’eted, may Chicago have the greatest (everything 1s greatest in Chicago) clumd burst on record. The prayers of St. Louis are with us. Black Hart. NEW YORK. Philadelphia, The meanest clty in the United States must be the one which could produce @ mind so mean as to offer “A Prize of Fifty Dollars tn Gold” as an inducement to mean peopie to make themselves still more mean by contemplating mean things, and searching for mean proof of the meanness of thelr fellows, and therefore the meanest of mean cltles must be New York. 1 do not need the balance of the allotted three hundred words to prove the truth of this propo- sition. T would request you to close this competition forthwith and send me the prize offered, were it *not that 1 am quite sure that so many others will come to the same concluston, and for the same reason, that thero will be less than a two-cent stamp apiece for the successful contestants. Very truly yours, gy. W. comicbooks.com